From a High Tower

by Mercedes Lackey

  “Because ruins are not always empty.”

  Together they threaded their way through the wagons and the show folk setting themselves up for an overnight stay. Those who normally camped in tents had extracted blankets and canvas to bed down under the shelter of the wagons, and were setting up several central fire pits against the fall of night. It looked as if they had done this before, since no one seemed in the least put out by the change in camping arrangements. No one paid any attention to the two young women who were making their way toward the decrepit remains of what must have been some imposing . . . and unfriendly . . . buildings. Unfriendly, because the windows in those battered walls were very small, and there weren’t a lot of them. It must have been dark and gloomy inside those places, when they had still been standing.

  Rosamund clambered her way into the largest. There were huge chunks of masonry and fallen pillars scattered about the interior, which was probably why the buffalo and cattle had not been penned here. It would be a disaster if one of them was to step into a hole and break a leg in a panic. Giselle waited at what had been the doorway as Rosamund poked around inside.

  Finally Rosamund came out, and her frown had deepened.

  “What did you find?” Giselle asked, as the Earth Master began a determined trudge back to the encampment.

  “It was a convent. Not just any convent. A Magdalene convent. And that . . . could be bad. I need to talk to Cody and Fox at once.” They both spotted the former seeing to his own comfort under the bandwagon, and Rosamund picked up her pace.

  “Why?” Giselle asked. “Mother and I lived in the abbey and it was fine. Very peaceful, in fact.”

  “Because Magdalene convents were where girls who got themselves into trouble were often essentially imprisoned,” Rosamund explained. “There are generally unhappy ghosts. There are sometimes angry and dangerous ghosts.” She bit off what she was saying as they reached Cody. “Captain! A word!”

  “Anytime, Miz Rosamund,” Cody drawled, straightening up from where he had been kneeling in the grass. “But iffen it’s a complaint ’bout the accommodations, I’m a-feared I can’t help y’all.”

  “Not . . . exactly.” Rosamund crossed her arms over her chest and took a stance that suggested that she was not to be trifled with or cajoled. “You need to issue orders that no one is to go wandering in those ruins after dark. And if you have some sort of Elemental that can guard you as you sleep, I cannot stress enough that you should do so.”

  “Already did the first—took a look-see, and I don’ need nobody breakin’ a leg in there.” He gave her a quizzical look. “I ain’t no Master though; jest got a liddle Fire Magic. What’s got your tail all bushed?”

  “That’s what’s left of a Magdalene Convent, and there could be dangerous spirits about once the sun sets—” Rosamund began, and was interrupted by Cody chuckling.

  “Missy, I dunno what spooks you Germans, but us Americans ain’t a-feared of no ghosties. Specially not ghosts of nuns, of all damn things.” At the sight of Rosamund’s fuming face, he just laughed a little more. “Iffen y’all had said there was some sorta old god, or other nasty critter in there, it’d be one thing. But ghosts cain’t hurt nobody, all they kin do is skeer ya. An’ I ain’t a-feared of ghosts, an’ anyway, y’all don’t even know if there’s any in there.”

  Rosamund looked as if she was ready to explode . . . and then she just turned on her heel and left Cody chuckling behind her. Giselle ran to catch up with her. She was fuming under her breath as she headed for where the Pawnee were encamped. Giselle couldn’t make out what she was saying, but she really didn’t need to.

  “He’s trying to assert himself, you know,” she pointed out. “His pride was hurt because you invoked your authority as one of the Brotherhood and attached yourself to the show without so much as a by-your-leave, and he sees this as a way to get some of his own back.”

  “That doesn’t make him any less of an idiot!” she snarled. “He has no idea!”

  By this point they were at the fire pit the Pawnee had set up, and she made a visible effort to get her temper under control before she spoke to them.

  “Medicine Chief Fox-Who-Leads,” she said, formally, in careful Pawnee. “I wish to speak with you and your warriors about the dangers that may be dwelling in yonder stone houses.”

  Seeing that this was a serious matter, Leading Fox stood up, and the rest of the Pawnee turned and gave her their complete attention. “We have spoken of the need to stand a watch, Medicine Woman,” Fox replied. “Have you learned something more?”

  “I have learned that this is a place that may be full of angry ghosts,” she told them all, her lips thinning a little. “Captain Cody does not believe that ghosts can harm him.”

  “Captain Cody is my friend, but sometimes a fool.” All of the Pawnee nodded at this, and Rosamund relaxed a little, looking a bit mollified by their reaction. “The wise man knows that angry ghosts have many ways of causing harm. Do you know the exact sort of angry ghost that may be harbored there?”

  She shook her head. “There are many possibilities. If I tell you to look for one, and another, different sort comes, you may be caught off guard. I ask you only to set your spirit animals to watch and warn.”

  “It shall be so.” Leading Fox quickly agreed. “We will take great care, and should something alert us, we will come to you.”

  “My thanks,” Rosamund told them, and she and Giselle went to find the “chuck wagon,” queued up to get their bread and stew, and ate it in silence. No one else seemed to notice, however, since just about everyone else was grumbling good-naturedly about the “unnatural” abundance of trees that was making a decent camp so hard to put together.

  They left their dishes to be cleaned up, went back to their vardos, and sat in the front doors, facing the forest as the sun began to set. “Do you think you can coax out some Air Elementals to stand watch?” Rosamund said after a long silence.

  “I can try,” Giselle replied, and spun up tenuous little tendrils of Air Magic, sending them wafting out into the woods—away from the direction of the ruins—bearing the message that she would like, please, for something friendly to do her a favor in return for another. Meanwhile Rosamund had gotten down on the ground and had placed one hand on the earth, presumably doing some “calling” of her own.

  Giselle actually had not expected to get any response, since she had seen absolutely no sign of Air Elementals lurking anywhere since they had entered the deeper forest, but it was she who was answered first.

  Not a night-sylph, but three of the smaller, shyer creatures she knew as “wisps.” Not the more dangerous sort, that lured the unwary into marshes to drown, but the ones that could only be seen faintly, at night, at a distance, and vanished if they sensed they were being watched.

  Up close, they were tiny, thin, sexless creatures floating in the middle of barely visible orbs of light. They approached her cautiously, and hovered just in front of her face.

  ?

  Not an actual sentence or even a thought, just a general sense of inquiry.

  “My friend, the Earth Master, fears there may be dangerous things sleeping in the human ruins,” she breathed, being very careful not to startle them.

  Again, the reply she got was not in words. It was more the feeling of, “Of course there are dangerous things. And?”

  “Would you stand watch and wake us if one of our humans is in danger from them?” she asked. “I can offer this—” and she spun up a ball of Air Magic for them.

  !

  They gathered around it, yearning for it, not daring to touch it, glancing from it to her and back again.

  And the feeling she got from them was, “Is that all you want? In return for this?”

  “Yes, this is all I want. Watch the night through. If any of the humans here are endangered by anything in the ruins, wake me.”

  The th
ree little things turned toward her and nodded emphatically. She released the ball of Air Magic to them, and they gathered around it, for all the world like three little moths drinking from a drop of nectar. The ball contracted, then vanished, and all three of them were glowing visibly brighter. They hovered in front of her again, all three bowed at the waist, and then flitted to the top of the vardo, where they took up a posture of watchfulness.

  When she turned to look at Rosamund, she found her friend surrounded by at least twenty odd little creatures that looked as if they were made of bits of forest detritus. Very peculiar little things they were too, no two alike, covered in odd garments of moss and leaves, spiderwebs and pine needles, flowers and woven grasses. She was apportioning bread and sugar cubes out to them with all the gravity of a paymaster giving out wages. When the last of them had taken up his or her burden and vanished into the long grasses, she straightened. “Well, my lot is a little braver than yours. Then again, Earth Elementals are very difficult to hurt, and I very much doubt that a ghost will even take notice of them. I think we can go to bed. But . . .”

  “But?” Giselle asked.

  “Sleep in your clothing,” Rosamund replied. “And sleep lightly.”

  10

  GISELLE was certain she would never be able to sleep, but the moment she put her head down on the pillow, it was as if sleep suddenly smothered her. Just like that, instantly, she was asleep and aware of absolutely nothing. She lay utterly insensible until the moment a sharp pain lanced her nose.

  It hurt! And it jolted her from her nose to her toes.

  She came awake at once, only to hear a snap, see a spark arc from one of the wisps to her nose, and feel the same sharp, jagged pain again, although this time it was confined to her face. That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt any the less! “Ow!” she cried, sitting up and clapping both hands to the offended appendage. “Why!” Then it dawned on her. This must have been the only way the wisps could wake her up! I have never, ever, been that thoroughly asleep. “Oh! Thank you!”

  She scrambled out of her bed, glad she had followed Rosamund’s instructions to lie down fully clothed. Her feet hit the floor with a thud—she’d worn her boots as well—and she called up a glow on her own hand, making it shine as the wisps did. It was far safer to do that than to fumble for matches and a lantern in her half-befuddled state. She felt almost as if she had been drugged as she shook her head to clear it, but she knew that the only things she had had to eat and drink were those that Rosamund shared. Rosamund would not have drugged her. There was no reason for anyone else to drug her.

  Therefore, that left magic. Magic which, by the utter silence of the entire camp, was intended to keep everyone in his or her bed. No wonder the wisps had had a hard time waking her. She knuckled her eyes and took deep breaths of the chill, damp air, and forced her mind to clear.

  !!!! said the wisps, dancing urgently and madly. And they flashed an image of . . . someone, someone male by the outline, walking into the ruins. Well, that certainly woke her up! It looked as if all of Rosamund’s fears were justified. But who could be the idiot stupid enough to go strolling into the ruins in the middle of the night? And why was he awake, and not the rest of the camp?

  Now fired with urgency of her own, she unbolted and opened her door and jumped down into the grass next to the horses, who themselves were so deeply asleep they didn’t even snort. And that was even more alarming. If even the horses had been sunk into sleep . . .

  A mere heartbeat later, she heard Rosamund snatching open the door of her vardo and held up her glowing hand to give her fellow Master light to see by. Rosamund nodded her thanks and swung herself down out of her wagon, dropping down beside Giselle, a coach gun in one hand.

  Giselle shivered in the chill, damp air. The scent of old, dead leaves and pine needles hung heavily around them. “Do you know who—” she began not even bothering to whisper, because clearly you could fire off a cannon through the camp and not wake anyone.

  “Captain Cody,” Rosamund bit off, her face full of annoyance and anger. “Damnation! I warned him—”

  “I believe he was singled out,” said Leading Fox, coming around from the side of Giselle’s vardo, walking so silently neither of them had heard him. “I do not think your warning made any difference. He has just enough magic to be susceptible, and not enough to protect him. We should have thought of that and taken steps. I blame myself. I could at least have left an owl with him.” Fox had an owl on each shoulder, and three more hovering above his head.

  Rosamund bit off another curse, and thrust the coach gun at Fox. She reached into the vardo and brought out a pair of hand-crossbows. “Can you summon more than just those little things?” she asked Giselle. “They won’t be of much help, but if we are up against ghosts, Air is the best power to use against them.”

  Well, if they are not afraid to come. . . . Giselle shut her eyes and gathered Air Magic around herself, calling it down out of the sky, envisioning it collecting around her like an ever-thickening cloud. Then she tried to summon any Air Elemental that might be within reach, thinking how much they needed help right now. If this was a case of spirits or ghosts, Rosamund’s Earth Elementals would not be of much use, but Rosamund was right, Air would be. She felt the summons whirling out of her impelled by the Power of Air, and hoped there was something nearby besides her three wisps that might be brave enough to reply.

  Something . . . several somethings at least . . . answered wordlessly. She continued to call.

  When she opened her eyes, she felt a little faint with relief to see a good dozen sober-faced night-sylphs, at least as many pixies, and several dozen of the tinier Air Elementals, all of them—well, all the ones near enough for her to see—looking determined. The night-sylphs, all of them, were armed with what looked like swords of glass. The pixies and the tiny ones were armed too, if not with knives and miniature swords, then with their own long claws. The pixies were creatures the size of dolls, but with strange attenuated bodies and long limbs, mostly clothed in colorful rags, and with dragonfly wings. Their joints were knobby, and their faces more than a little animalistic. The smaller ones—Mother had never called them anything but alfar—were also winged, but looked half-human and half-insect, with touches of bat and bird.

  She glanced at Rosamund, to see if she could see the little army. Evidently she could, for she nodded with satisfaction and hoisted one of her crossbows. “Now we need to run,” the Earth Master said, “or at least as close as we can without breaking our necks—I don’t—”

  But as if to answer her, the wisps zoomed in front of them and began glowing with all their might, until their combined light at least equaled that of a very good lamp. That gave the three of them enough light to see by that they could scramble, if not precisely run, through the camp and into the ruins. Thank the good God that we always lay out an orderly camp, Giselle thought, as she jumped over wagon tongues and skirted the edges of glowing fire pits. Then they reached the edge of the ruins and the going got slower, as they had to avoid fallen stones or risk breaking a leg. The wisps seemed to know which way Cody had gone, from the direct path they were taking. Bless you little ones! she thought at them, and in answer they glowed just a little brighter.

  They fled through the ruins and then into the woods beyond them. The vast number of fallen branches and yet more stones made the going slower—and here, as opposed to the opposite side of the ruins where they had camped, there was a lot of undergrowth that even the wisps were having a hard time pushing through. They all slowed to a crawl. And now . . . now Giselle thought she could hear . . . music? Dancing music?

  Rosamund cursed, and hung her crossbows on her belt as she shoved her way past some bushes. “Give me the gun!” she shouted to Fox, who tossed it smoothly to her. She caught it and sped up, the wisps increasing their speed to keep ahead of her.

  What does she know?

  And then, they burst into a cle
aring.

  No.

  A graveyard.

  Nothing grew here but moss, as the entire graveyard was heavily overhung with trees that must have kept the spot gloomy and dim even at noontide. The headstones were old, old and small, and many of them had toppled over. But that was not what made Giselle stumble to a halt.

  It was the sight of Cody Lee being whirled around in a dance in the center of the graveyard, clearly against his will, by nine ghosts.

  At least, Giselle assumed they were ghosts.

  They were all female, and all wore something like a nightdress made of some tattered material. They all glowed, and were as transparent as any sylph; in fact the entire graveyard glowed with a strange, blue, unearthly light. But they had no wings, their hair had been shorn, and they all wore expressions of fierce glee as they concentrated on passing Cody from one to another in the wild dance. There was music coming from all around, but it didn’t sound modern, it didn’t even sound like the dance music played for the Maifests. It was frenetic, and Giselle couldn’t even recognize what sort of instruments it might be being played on. If there were instruments at all. It wasn’t exactly faint, and yet it sounded as if it was coming from a great distance.

  There was a faint, foul stench of rot here, of things that were long dead. And it was freezing cold, Giselle’s breath puffing out in clouds.

  Cody looked terrified, as well he should, as he passed from partner to whirling partner. He also looked exhausted, and these spirits did not look as if they intended to let him rest, not even for a moment. Can you force someone to dance long enough that he dies of exhaustion?

  For one moment, Cody was on the very edge of the group, about to be tossed back into the middle. That was when the coach gun roared, shattering the music, as Rosamund fired into the midst of the spirits, literally shattering them as well, for a moment at least. Cody managed to stumble free, to stagger to Fox’s feet and fall, panting. But the spirits gathered themselves back together again, and now they were fully aware of the interlopers. They bared their teeth in ferocious snarls, and began to flow toward them, and a wave of paralyzing fear preceded them.